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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/41371
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/41371
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Expanding on Cyn's last paragraph.

In the case of bootcamp, you can skip it entirely and just give a summary at the end. The important element is making the reader know what all the boot-camp brought to your character. As a matter of fact, the knowledge could have come from having trained for many years, or from uploading it in their memory (e.g. as it happens in the Matrix movies). There is an emotional aspect too, and the true deep meaning of it can be fully grasped at the end of the process.

In practice:

> MC enrolled in the academy on May 20th. It was a bright day and MC was singing a martial tune with the heart full of hopes and dreams of glory in his young mind. It took six years to break him, and just when he was about to quit, he reached that incredible graduation like an animal about to drown who miraculously feels the shore under the paws.
> 
> "You look so changed." said his childhood friend, meeting him at the reception. "And that shooting demonstration! Your skills are amazing!"
> 
> "Yes ma'am." said he.
> 
> "I imagine you have a lot of stories to tell."
> 
> "Not really. At first it was just running around the courtyard with the Sergeants screaming in your brain. Then it was getting to love and fear the weapons. It is like a relationship, you know? The first day you think it is going to explode in your hands, and you don't want to ruin it like that. After one hundred days, even if you could dismantle and reassemble it with a blindfold, and yet you cannot think of parting from it."
> 
> "Those sound like incredible stories to me."
> 
> "They did to me too, years ago. Now it is a past I wish I could forget."

There we have it. We skipped six years. Asserted what the training was about. Showed that the MC has gained some skills which you may want to use later. And we also hinted at the emotional impact on the MC. And by keeping the time jump in one place, it does not feel choppy, and it does not drag.

Original score: 4